


The Third F

by queerlyobscure (softestpunk)



Series: Good Morning, Good Morning [3]
Category: Captain America (2011), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Friendship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-28
Updated: 2012-05-28
Packaged: 2017-11-06 03:35:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/414267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestpunk/pseuds/queerlyobscure
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony recognises that some of the blame for earlier events has to rest on him, and for once, he's going to apologise first. With food.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Third F

“What do you want, Stark?” Steve folded his arms over his chest, posture so closed that a clam could take lessons from him.  
  
 _ Stark . _ Crap. He’d been demoted to last-name basis. Not that Tony had been expecting much better, but it never hurt to hope. Except when it did and you needed to pause for a moment because you hadn’t really thought it’d be  that bad.  
  
“I just wanted to see you. And to apologise for the way I’ve behaved.” Tony had practised saying that for hours, and he was pleased with the way it’d come out. Sounded almost as though he knew how to apologise.  
  
Maybe it was his imagination, but Steve seemed to soften a little at that. “I wasn’t expecting an apology.”  
  
“I see my reputation precedes me.” Tony smiled wryly. “I’m not in the habit of apologising, but I don’t want to fight with you, either. JARVIS tells me that the way to solve that is to act like an adult and just say sorry.”  
  
“Your computer tells you things.” Steve looked at Tony suspiciously, as though he was concerned that whatever remained of his sanity was on vacation right now.  
  
“It’s complicated. He’s smarter than I am, though, so I listen when I want something. And I want to not be fighting with you.”  
  
Steve shrugged. “Then we won’t fight. We’ll just keep out of each other’s way.”  
  
“I phrased that poorly. I want to be your friend.”  
  
This time, Steve’s eyebrows made a run for his hairline. “Pardon?”  
  
Again, maybe Tony was just seeing what he wanted to see, but was Captain America, defender of liberty and everything else, blushing?   
  
Trying not to think about how appealing a shy Steve was, Tony fixed his gaze on him and nodded. “I want to be your friend. If this Avengers thing is going to work out, then you and I need to get along. And... I have issues, you know?”  
  
“You don’t say,” Steve deadpanned.  
  
“Yeah.” Tony shrugged. “I guess that’s obvious. My point is that I know I’m an enormous dick, but I’d like to make it up to you?”  
  
“Make it up to me how?”  
  
“Food.” Food was safe. Enjoying food was pretty much universally okay. No culture clash there. Hopefully.  
  
“Food?” Steve seemed honestly curious. That was good.  
  
“Food.” Tony nodded. “Breaking bread together seems to be the traditional way of keeping the peace. Not that we’re going to eat bread, unless you count breadsticks.”  
  
“You called me up here to have dinner with you?”  
  
“Got it in one.” Tony grinned, hoping his nervousness that this would all backfire horribly wasn’t showing through too badly. Or that if it was, Steve would take pity on him.  
  
“All right. I could eat.”  
  
Relief flooded Tony’s mind, threatening to make him pass out with the dizzy lightheadedness of it all. “Great. Excellent. Umm, in that case, come through?” He turned to go through the door to the room behind him, holding his breath in the hopes that he hadn’t overdone it. Suddenly, dinner alone for two seemed way too intimate. At least he hadn’t gone with the candles and roses.  
  
“You set up already?”  
  
“Well, yeah. I would have looked kind of stupid if I offered you dinner and then didn’t actually have any dinner to offer you, right?”  
  
“I guess, I just... figured you got someone else to do this kind of thing for you.”  
  
“Oh, I’m pretty sure I’ve put a dozen kids delivering takeaway through college. But I can, occasionally, work my way around a kitchen as well. With detailed instructions and plenty of time and the appropriate motivation. Plus, pasta. Not exactly the most complex dish known to man. But I didn’t want to risk poisoning you with anything I could actually have screwed up.”  
  
“I think that’s thoughtful of you?” Steve was clearly not sure what to think about that. “Do you need any help?”  
  
“No, you sit. I still need to grab the wine - do you drink?”  
  
Steve smiled a lopsided smile. “I think you’re mistaking old for naïve. I was in the army, Tony.”  
  
“Right.” Tony nodded a few times, stunned at hearing his first name again. He’d obviously done something right. “Great, wine it is, then. Just make yourself comfortable and I’ll be right back.”  
  
Tony still wasn’t a hundred percent sure what he’d done, but he suspected that somewhere between the food and the wine, he’d done it right. Steve was slowly opening up to him, sharing stories about his past and smiling more often than Tony had previously thought he’d be capable of and generally behaving like the all right guy his files said he was. Maybe it just took a warm meal and a stomach full of good booze to finish defrosting him.  
  
The other thing he noticed was that he’d kind of made the mistake everyone else does - assuming that your generation is the first to ever do anything naughty. Steve Rogers might have projected the air of a good boy - and he had a good heart, no question - but he also had stories to tell.  
  
“You’re not at all like I expected you to be,” Tony confessed halfway through his third glass of wine. He wasn’t really drunk enough for honesty, but honesty didn’t seem to care. “I grew up hearing stories about you all the time. Having a hard time making the myth fit the man.”  
  
“Is that a bad thing?” There was that shy little smile again, the one that appeared on and off while they’d been talking tonight. If only there was some way to bottle that smile.  
  
“Not even a little. I always rebelled against everything I thought you were. I mean, I don’t mean to get touchy-feely about this, but it was like my dad had this... other son, out there somewhere. I decided early on that if I was anything like you, he’d never be able to be proud of me, because I couldn’t compete with the guy he never really stopped searching for. Stop me when this gets creepy, okay?”  
  
“I don’t think it’s creepy. I get worrying about your dad not being proud of you.”  
  
Tony smiled into his wine glass. “Yeah. I guess you would. It’s hard to imagine you as a dorky, skinny guy when all I get to see is the super soldier pin-up.”  
  
“Pin up?” Steve sounded alarmed. Tony suspected he needed to regain control of his mouth, and quickly.   
  
“I meant poster-boy. Sorry, used all my brainpower for the day on following the recipe.”  
  
 _ Excellent save, Tony . _  
  
Steve seemed to think so as well, nodding his acceptance and swallowing down the rest of his second glass before reaching out to pour himself another. It occurred to Tony that Steve could drink him under the table and not even have a headache in the morning to show for it, but only in the dull way you realise things you already knew and then continue to ignore them. He accepted the offered refill of his own glass gratefully.  
  
“It was worthy of the great Tony Stark,” Steve spoke up after a few moments. “Dinner, I mean. SHIELD aren’t big on... food.”  
  
“I can’t imagine they would be. So you haven’t had a decent meal since the forties?”  
  
“Pretty much.” Steve shrugged. “Thanks, Tony.”  
  
There’s that word again. It sounds so  good coming from Steve’s mouth that Tony finds himself staring at his lips for way too long. Which reminds him of what he’s supposed to be apologising for.  
  
“Listen, serious apology time. You’re right, I should have known better and I shouldn’t have even started it and when I did, I should have stopped it. I am actually supposed to be a grown up.”  
  
To Tony’s surprise, Steve shrugged. “It’s okay. Worse things have happened to me.” For some reason, it sounds like Steve has put a lot of thought into this. “I probably shouldn’t have broken your nose over it.”  
  
“I healed.”  
  
“I know. Do you think that makes us even?”   
  
For a moment, Tony thought this was about to turn into a discussion about whether accidentally goading someone into having sex with you out of anger was equal to breaking someone’s nose, and then he realised that actually, Steve was holding out an olive branch. And that was okay.  
  
“Yeah, I think we’re even.”


End file.
